Integrated software for analysis and synthesis of voice quality

Abstract

Voice quality is an important perceptual cue in many disciplines, but knowledge of its nature is limited by a poor understanding of the relevant psychoacoustics. This article (aimed at researchers studying voice, speech, and vocal behavior) describes the UCLA voice synthesizer, software for voice analysis and synthesis designed to test hypotheses about the relationship between acoustic parameters and voice quality perception. The synthesizer provides experimenters with a useful tool for creating and modeling voice signals. In particular, it offers an integrated approach to voice analysis and synthesis and allows easy, precise, spectral-domain manipulations of the harmonic voice source. The synthesizer operates in near real time, using a parsimonious set of acoustic parameters for the voice source and vocal tract that a user can modify to accurately copy the quality of most normal and pathological voices. The software, user's manual, and audio files may be downloaded from http://brm.psychonomic-journals.org/content/supplemental. Future updates may be downloaded from www.surgery.medsch.ucla.edu/glottalaffairs/.